in Fucks el 99 



Sea, based on a History of the Mountains of Thuringia," 

 appeared in the Transactions of the Electoral Society of 

 Mayence, established at Erfurt. 1 It was illustrated with a 

 geological map and sections of the country. Eleven years 

 later he published in German a Sketch of the most Ancient 

 History of the Earth and Man, which contained a further 

 development of his geological views. 2 



These views were founded on the author's own observa- 

 tions in the region where he had been born and passed his 

 life. He recognized as clearly as Lehmann, and with more 

 accuracy of detail, the sequence of stratified rocks resting 

 in gently-inclined strata against the older upturned masses 

 of the mountains. He noted the position of the Coal with 

 its exotic plants, followed by the copper-bearing shales, 

 Zechstein, mottled sandstone, marls, gypsum, and finally 

 the Muschelkalk. 



Taking no limited or parochial view of the phenomena 

 that presented themselves before his eyes, he connected the 

 history of his little principality with that of the whole 

 globe. In the order of succession of the rocks around him, 

 he saw the records of a series of changes which the earth 

 had once undergone. These changes were conceived by 

 him to have been of no abnormal kind, but to have 

 resembled those which might quite possibly occur now, 

 for, in his opinion, our planet had always presented 

 phenomena similar to those of the present time. He saw 



1 " Historia terrae et maris, ex historia Thuringiae per montium de- 

 scriptionem erecta" (Trans. Elect. Soc. Mayence, vol. ii. pp. 44-209). The 

 map was the first detailed geognostical and petrographical map of a large 

 district in Germany, and the sections were excellent for their time. 



2 Entwurf zu der altesten Erd- und Menschengeschichte, 275 pages, 8vo, 

 1773. 



